Big Wave Surfing, Coke Smuggling and Murder-Mark Branon

Quick Overview

Mark Branon details his extensive criminal history, starting from smuggling weed and cocaine in his early twenties, progressing to large-scale international drug trafficking involving private planes and collaboration with Mexican cartels, enduring federal prosecution, avoiding assassination plots, and ultimately receiving a near-life sentence which was partially overturned due to Supreme Court rulings on sentencing statutes.

Key Points: Branon acquired his first federal cocaine case at 21 and subsequently began flying loads of weed into the desert on special parole using a Cessna 206 equipped with bladder tanks, noting his mentality was always "I'm going to make money or else." He worked with high-level operators, including the Arellano Felix organization, moving large loads of weed using U-Hauls with false walls and eventually 18-wheelers, later moving to work with Sinaloa guys utilizing border tunnels. Branon recounts a failed attempt to lure a cooperating witness, Rene the rat, into a swimming pool to kill him, but spared the man's life after seeing his two young children in the truck, a decision he later called his biggest mistake. After the prosecutor, Billy the Bulldog Rosen, pursued a rarely used Serious Drug Offender Act that could result in mandatory life in prison for a marijuana conviction, Branon's associates allegedly shot the prosecutor's brother, who was mistaken for her in a case of mistaken identity. Branon's lawyer, Sheldon Sherman, who was laundering his money, flipped and became a co-defendant, leading to Branon's re-arrest after his initial bond was secured through friends' property. His 60-year sentence for conspiracy to murder the prosecutor and trafficking charges was significantly reduced after the Supreme Court deemed 924(c) residual clause convictions unconstitutional via the LaMorte Davis case, allowing him to avoid life imprisonment. During re-sentencing, the prosecutor argued against leniency by revealing knowledge of the attempted hit on her and the shooters being caught, resulting in a 27-year sentence under the continuing criminal enterprise statute.